#queen of the andals and the first men

[xbrokencrownx]

“The burden is a heavy one… it’s too heavy”

[mayangelus]

Yer jalan atthirari anni

“—Trust me, Your Grace. If he didn't like her, we'd know.”

Game of Thrones: season 1, episode 1.

[v1senyatargaryen]

If Daenerys Targaryen was a faceless character…

[yourmumsc0ck]

Princess Rizznyra Targaryen first of her name

[reignof-fyre]

Colonizers impose their own cultural values, religions, and laws, making policies that do not favour the Indigenous Peoples. They seize land and control the access to resources and trade. As a result, the Indigenous people become dependent on colonizers.

Settler colonialization either rules as a minority group through oppression and assimilation of the indigenous peoples or by establishing themself as the demographic majority through driving away, disadvantaging, or outright killing the indigenous people.

Oh, I see...

The First Men came with bronze swords and great leathern shields, riding horses. As the men settled in the new land, carving out holdfasts and farms, they chopped down and burned the carved weirwoods that were sacred to the gods of the children of the forest. This provoked wars between the children and the First Men. Though the children fought with their greenseers, magic, and wood dancers, the First Men were larger, stronger, and more technologically advanced. The First Men cut down weirwoods as they believed that the greenseers could see through the eyes of the trees.

Hm

Brandon of the Bloody Blade is a legendary son of Garth Greenhand. He is credited with driving giants away from the Reach and warring against children of the forest, slaying so many at Blue Lake that it became known as Red Lake. In some tales, he is mentioned as the ancestor or father of Bran the Builder, making him a possible ancestor of House Stark.

Oh...

Andals first landed in the Fingers and attacked the First Men living in the Vale. They burnt out the weirwood groves, hacked down the faces, and slaughtered the children of the forest that they came across. Everywhere, they proclaimed the triumph of the Seven over the old gods. A hill, now known to the Westerosi as High Heart, was sacred to the children of the forest. There, the Andal king Erreg the Kinslayer cut down the children’s grove of thirty-one weirwoods. It is said that the First Men killed half of the children of the forest with bronze blades, and the Andals finished the job with iron

Interesting....

The Westeros of Aegon's youth was divided into seven quarrelsome kingdoms, and there was hardly a time when two or three of these kingdoms were not at war with one another. [Fire & Blood]

Aegon the Conqueror brought fire and blood to Westeros, but afterward, he gave them peace, prosperity, and justice

Aegon's first established law was the King's Peace, which forbid conflict in the realm without the leave of the Iron Throne. Aegon treated the defeated lords with respect and allowed each region to retain its own laws and customs and for the lords to retain both the right of pit and gallows and the first night. Aegon often travelled the realm with six maesters who educated him on each region's local customs and history.

...Aegon ignored the suggestions of making the ironborn vassals to the Tullys of Riverrun or the Lannisters of Casterly Rock, as well as the suggestion to exterminate the ironborn by dragonflame. Instead, Aegon allowed the ironborn to name their own lord paramount, for which the ironborn chose Vickon Greyjoy as Lord of the Iron Islands.

The remaining twenty-four years of Aegon's reign were peaceful, so much that the last two decades of his reign were later called the Dragon's Peace by the maesters of the Citadel. He spent much of his time consolidating his power by travelling throughout the Seven Kingdoms and building his capital at King's Landing.

Oh, really.

If the Valyrian's truly were the colonisers many in the fandom claim they are, Westeros would be extremely different.

For one, the predominant faith would be the Old Gods of Valyria, and the Faith of the Seven and the old gods of the north & children wouldn't exist. People would be forced to intermarry siblings/relatives and perhaps even keep slaves according to pre-Doom Valyria (even though the Targaryens stopped slavery once they left Valyria) or forced to marry Valyrian people to dilute their First Men or Andal blood so, eventually, most great houses were mostly Valyrian.

Temples dedicated to the Fourteen Flames would be built, dozens of dragons hatched and left to roam freely and hunt as they please, blood magic and sorcerers aplenty.

The Valyrians didn't do any of that. Aegon I ensured that the separate Kingdoms kept their culture and traditions and respected the Faith. It even says that many Targaryens gave up their faith in the Old Valyrian Gods (or so they say) to worship the Faith of the Seven or Old Gods of Westeros.

Tl;dr; the first men and andals colonized westeros to suit them, slaughtering the natives (children of the forest and giants) and the Targaryens (Valyrians) indeed conquered westeros but respected the land and people and only brought their ways of dragon riding and incestuous marriages who hurt no one :)

And also all the Targaryen's since Daenys's children's era were born on Westetosi soil, Dragonstone/Kings Landing, and thus were in actual fact westerosi but culturally and ethnically Valyrian.

[emperor-king-jess]

I just want it to be known if too many people keep putting disrespect on The rightful Queen Rhaenyra and start s*utshaming her or fat shaming her I WILL start cackling when all of the Hightower/Targs die and be back to remind you who’s children live on

[rowaelinsdaughter]

i want rhaenyra in ways that are biblically wrong 🧎‍♀️🧎‍♀️🧎‍♀️

[problemswithbooks]

Not going to lie it's a little weird to see people who are huge fans of the Targaryens try and down play the bad stuff they did.

Like when they say they didn't colonize Westeros they just conquered it. As if that's any better.

By definition, no the Targaryens didn't colonize Westeros, but that's less because they were so much better than the First Men or Andals and more because they simply couldn't. The Valyrians did colonize the places they conquered in Essos, but by the time Aegon crowned himself King of Westeros all but his family remained of the pure blooded Valyrians.

They couldn't colonize in the traditional sense of the word because there were only a handful of them left--not a large scale population that could come and take over all the lands and Houses of Westeros.

But that doesn't mean conquest is better. It's still subjugating and controlling people with military force.

It's also weird when they argue that Westeros did better under the Targaryens so actually the conquest was good. Did Westeros have some really despicable policies or constant fighting, sure, but a country--or a batch of countries, having bad morals or infighting doesn't give someone else the right to take them over and instill themselves as King. That is the kind of excuse the US uses all the time and every thinks that's pretty shit.

But the prophecy? What about that?

Well, it's honestly kind of stupid, or in the very least makes Aegon and any of his family that heard it look stupid. If he legitimately had a dream of the world ending unless one of his family had their ass on a united Westeros throne it was brain-dead not to flaunt that like no tomorrow. In world where there's magic and dragons, where the Targaryens already saved themselves from the Doom of Valyria a hundred years prior there would be no reason for Westeros to believe it.

I'm sure some of the Lords would have still resisted regardless, but it still would have made it much easier for the Targaryens over all to rule if the entire country was under the impression they needed to be in charge to save the world. Heck, it also might have put a damper on some of the later infighting like the Dance if everyone had known. Could it have caused some problems, sure, but concealing from everyone but the heir is dimwitted simply because they could easily be killed off before passing it on.

But even if Aegon thought he needed to be King of Westeros to save the world that doesn't mean his conquest was good. If that was the case the Andals taking over Westeros from the First Men was justified to because they believed it was their promised land. Or were desperate to escape slavery under the Valyrians. But of course neither of those is a good excuse to subjugate an entire continent.

Another talking point is to point out that the real colonizers are the First Men and Andals not the Targaryens. As I said before that doesn't quite hold up because it's very likely given how they took over Essos that had more than a handful of Valyrians survived the doom they would have colonized Westeros or at least continued to colonize Essos.

On top of that the First Men colonized Westeros somewhere between 8,000 to 12,000 years ago, and eventually made peace with the Children of the Forest, worshiping their Gods, learning from them and all of them coming together to build the Wall. The Andals came to Westeros, at the earliest 2,000 years ago and colonized both the First Men and the Children of the Forest.

Meanwhile, by the time of Aegon's conquest of Westeros the Valyrians had only been gone a hundred years. Aegon was far more closely related to colonizers then the ancestors of the First Men and Andals that lived in Westeros when he conquered it. So to act as if it's only the Westerosi that have the blood of colonizers in their veins just isn't true. The Targaryens do to and it's much more recent.

And this isn't me saying the Targaryens are evil. The First Men and the Andals have some really awful stuff in their history, and even during the main books do some horrendous stuff. No one in this book series or the TV shows it's based on are entirely clean of fault or even unforgivable stuff like genocide, slavery or colonization.

My point isn't that the Targs are so much worse then the rest of the Houses in Westeros. Just like every other House they have good and bad members. And even the good ones have done terrible things while the worst of the worst sometimes do very very heroic things.

I don't like the argument that simply by being a Targaryen a character is bad or doomed or should fail. But that doesn't mean pretending the House is actually perfect and if they did something bad, like conquering a country and subjugating it's people under a Ruler they didn't want it's fine, plus those people actually deserved it because 2,000 years ago they did evil stuff themselves.

[drakaripykiros130ac]

🖤👑🖤

queen rhaenyra targaryen, the realms delight 🖤

[summitice]

Someone make a sketch where its a parody of house of the dragon and theyre trying to talk about important stuff but everyone is constantly getting interrupted by people walking into the room and being announced with increasingly long and ridiculous epithets

[jonsnowislovejonsnowislife]

Daenerys had a favorite child, she was not a perfect mother

[almoststeadyfire]

queen rhaenyra targaryen, first of her name, queen of the andals, the rhoynar, & the first men, queen of the seven kingdoms, protector of the realm, & breaker of backs

[zendayacolemann]

Queen Rhaenyra Targaryen, the First of Her Name, Queen of the Andals, and the Rhoynar, and the First Men, Lady of the Seven Kingdoms, and Protector of the Realm.

[mydairpercabeth]

if it wasnt clear before,

THIS BLOG IS TEAM BLACK AND WE RIDE FOR QUEEN RHAENYRA TARGARYEN, THE REALMS DELIGHT, FIRST OF HER NAME, QUEEN OF THE ANDALS, THE RHOYNAR AND THE FIRST MEN, LADY OF THE SEVEN KINGDOMS, PROTECTOR OF THE REALM

[daenerystemper]

QUEEN DAENERYS STORMBORN THE UNBURNT OF HOUSE TARGARYEN, THE FIRST OF HER NAME, THE QUEEN OF MEEREEN & THE QUEEN OF THE ANDALS, THE RHOYNAR AND THE FIRST MEN, KHALEESI OF THE GREAT GRASS SEA, BREAKER OF SHACKLES, LORD OF THE SEVEN KINGDOMS & PROTECTOR OF THE REALM & THE PRINCE WHO WAS PROMISED

[pulksten-blog]

Three hundred sets of eyes looked on as Prince Daemon Targaryen placed the Old Kings crown on the head of his wife, proclaiming her Rhaenyra of House Targaryen, First of Her Name, Queen of the Andals, the Rhoynar, and the First Men.